Mainlining Christmas

Like almost everyone who grew up in the 80's and 90's, The Simpsons became my favorite show almost the instant it started.  And it took a while for it to be supplanted, too.  The Simpsons had at least seven great years before running out of character-based humor and interesting stories. And this is the one that started it all.  Oh, sure, the characters were on the Tracy Ulman show prior to getting their own program, but they didn't enter the public consciousness until the Simpson's Christmas Special, more accurately called, "The Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire." I remember seeing this when it first aired.  In a world that's seen Beavis and Butthead, South Park, and Adult Swim, it's hard to convey the power these characters had when they got their first half hour all to themselves.  But The Simpsons predated all that: before Bart, the most subversive animated character most of us had seen was Fred Flintstone. To be honest, I wasn't expecti...

I have a fairly complicated relationship with Christmas carols.  I was a fervent believer in the separation of church and state from a young age, as well as a fervent non-believer in Jesus, but I love to sing.  This caused few problems in grade school, in which most music was of the non-challenging but secular-ish type: Up on the Rooftop, Here Comes Santa Claus and all that lot. As I got older, more religious music came into the “Winter” concerts, as they were called, and the teachers always tried to balance the songs out: a few explicitly Christian, a few holiday/secular, and one leftover slot for a Hanukkah tune. They didn't have a very large library of Hanukkah songs; I've probably sung “Hevenu Shalom Aleikhem” more than some actual Jewish kids. I grumbled privately about singing religious songs in school, but for the most part those songs have really lovely music, so I didn't grumble much. For a while I was obsessed with this version of Do You Hear What I Hear tha...

I don't recall having liked The Santa Clause when I saw it years ago (probably when it aired on TV sometime in the 90's), nor do I recall thinking it was a "good" movie.  But I have vague recollections of seeing it and thinking it wasn't an excruciatingly painful experience. Turns out my memories were distorted, because that was kind of awful.  I mean, I was expecting it to be an obnoxious vehicle for Tim Allen.  And I was expecting the fat jokes as the new Santa took shape. What I wasn't expecting was the abysmal acting from just about every minor character.  Nor was I ready for reindeer fart jokes or anything of the sort. The movie has an interesting premise, which is almost certainly lifted from Piers Anthony's "Riding a Pale Horse," save that Tim Allen becomes Santa instead of Death.  Portraying "Santa" as an office rather than an individual has merit, though it certainly doesn't get enough exploration.  Actually, the mo...

Now this show holds up.  There's an occasional dated reference, but in general Animaniacs is still really fun to watch.  There were two fully holiday-themed episodes released in 1993. Animaniacs: A Christmas Plotz / Little Drummer Warners (1993) Most of this episode is a cute riff on A Christmas Carol, with the CEO playing the role of Scrooge and the Warners as the ghosts. It has a nice ironic twist that I enjoyed quite a bit, and an assortment of short original songs. The second short in this episode is more or less a musical medley of Christmas Carols, loosely plotted around the Nativity. Now I'm often downright allergic to religion in my Christmas specials, but I actually found this fun and quite sweet.  The music is really well done, and a nice mix of spinning the lyrics into comedy and playing it straight. Animaniacs: Twas the Day Before Christmas / Jingle Boo / The Great Wakkorotti: The Holiday Concert / Toy Shop Terror / Yakko's Universe (1993) As you c...

Apparently, the war on Christmas just took a turn for the worse .  A pastor in Denmark executed a stuffed Christmas Elf by hanging.  He soon found a collection of garden gnomes in his front yard, which the media has dismissed as being from neighbors upset at the statement. That's because they don't know the code.  Christmas Elves don't operate within the law; that doesn't mean they're without order.  You make a Christmas Elf mad, you can expect to hear about it.  For the little things, they'll mess with your shoes.  Cross a line, and they'll hire a team of dwarves to go to town on your plumbing. But if you go after them personally - if you cross the elf family - they send you a message in gnomes.  Then it's just a matter of time.  Maybe days.  Maybe weeks.  Maybe years.  Sometimes they like to do it quick; sometimes they like to let their enemies sweat. But in the end, they'll demonstrate what those gnomes are for. For hundr...

I have really fond memories of this movie, and I was convinced I'd regret watching it again.  I'm happy to report that not only does the movie hold up, it's actually a bit better than I remembered.  This one really deserves its status as one the best Christmas movies out there. I appreciate that a spoiler warning is fairly absurd for a movie that came out in 1947 and that almost everyone's seen a dozen times on TV, but... I want to be sure for this one.  If, for whatever reason, you've never seen this, stop reading now and go see it.  Find it on TV, put it on your Netflix queue, or buy it on Amazon.  You can buy the digital download for four bucks .  Do what you have to, but make sure you see it. What really impresses me is that this is a fantasy without the supernatural.  There's ostensibly nothing magical that occurs in the movie, and yet it's magic to the core. The movie never confirms that Kris is the real deal.  Sure, he found a house...

I remember watching these episodes in high school; they often aired back-to-back.  I remembered the basic plot of each, but little else. Both of these shows are obvious, campy, melodramatic and purposely anachronistic.  I love them. Hercules: The Legendary Journeys: A Star to Guide Them (Season 3, Episode 9) The premise here is that Iolaus and two other guys are called to attend something special (the birth of Jesus, obviously.) On the way they stop to save a country full of babies by deposing a Herod-like king.  It's basically just a normal week. Corny?  Hell Yes.  These shows in general treated history like one big fun toy chest they could mix and match things from, so I'm not really bothered by the timeline problems inherent in the story.  Nor do I care that they mixed up Herod with a little Macbeth and a little Oedipus to create the main plot, and then it isn't even related to the Jesus part. Xena: Warrior Princess: A Solstice Carol  ...